Aniston Starts O'Reilly-Olbermann Feud

Who knew Jennifer Aniston still had this much clout? On Tuesday,
Bill O'Reilly summoned his inner culture-warrior for a segment on
Jennifer Aniston's parenting philosophy. He was upset because in a
recent interview Aniston promoted the idea that women "don't have to
settle with a man just to have a child." O'Reilly admonished her for
"diminishing the role of the dad":

Aniston
can hire a battery of
people to help her, but she cannot hire a dad. OK?
And Dads bring a
psychology to children that is, in this society, I believe, under
emphasized.

He
went on to moderate a pretty exhausting discussion about how Aniston is
negatively influencing 12-year-old girls. Now, enter Keith Olbermann,
who managed to make a bad cable TV moment even worse. On his show Wednesday
night, Olbermann connected O'Reilly's remarks to physical abuse he may
have
received as a child:

If you've
read Marvin Kitman's biography of
O'Reilly, it's pretty simple. Virtually every reference O'Reilly makes
to his own father describes how the man hit, slapped, punched him. As
Kitman put it, simply, O'Reilly has a history of physical abuse with his
father. It is actually very
sad.

It was a pretty low
blow—even for Olbermann. Something Frances Martel at
Mediaite puts into perspective quite
deftly:

Whether
or not the allegations made by Olbermann via Kitman’s book are true are
beside the point. Child abuse is not a political grenade to toss
hastily at people you don’t like. ...
This attack has nothing to do with Bill O’Reilly in any professional or
personal capacity, and only with speculation on a very serious topic
that tosses it to the realm of the frivolous.

Then
there’s the touchy subject of fathers in general, and how often
Olbermann likes to discuss his own seemingly beautiful relationship with
his father. Olbermann’s attack takes nothing away from the positive
impact of having a major cable news figure routinely emphasize how
important a father is in the development of the child– the world can
never have enough of that, and Olbermann’s regular James
Thurber segments are stellar programming. That is precisely
why he, of all people, should know better than to bring someone
else’s
deceased father into play in the cable game.